Econ 101

This is a response to the daft Obama campaign’s Life of Julia, that hymn to life as a government serf. The truth is that in this life you have to depend upon God, yourself and, if you are lucky, your family. Government assistance must exist for people who cannot take care of themselves, but as a way of life for those who can, it is soul destroying, trapping us, at best, in a permanent status of child-like dependence on the State, a dependence that is increasingly precarious as governments sink under the burden of unsustainable spending.

Another fineecon 101 video from the Center for Freedom and Prosperity. One of the main economic problems of our time is that we Americans tend to be experts at spending money and novices at making money. I will have a post on Christ and Scrooge later this month which will be rather negative towards Scrooge. (Surprise!) However, perhaps nationally we need a bit of the Scrooge attitude towards making money and less of the spendthrift habits that have been a disaster for us publicly and privately.

Another fine econ 101 video from the Center for Freedom and Prosperity. That government monopolies like the post office and public schools deliver inferior service at greatly inflated cost is as well established as any fact can be this side of Eternity. The mystery to me is why we still keep making this fundamental mistake of assuming that a government monopoly is necessary rather than looking into new measures to reach the goal sought. The faith in government, especially on the political Left, is as charming in its naivety as it is irrational.

The last century was often a long sad failure to heed the warnings of Rudyard Kipling in his poem The Gods of the Copybook Headings. I hope this century will not repeat this inability to learn some very simple lessons about the limits of both government and wishful thinking.